author-in-training

The Voiceprint Project

Happy Sunday! I’ve been talking on my Twitter all this weekend about an exciting announcement I would be making for The Voiceprint Project soon, and now I am officially stepping up to address those Tweets. If you’ve been following my blog and/or my Twitter, you know that last Friday, May 6th, was the launch of my online initiative, on Twitter and otherwise. I am so thrilled to say that I have gotten so much support in these past nine days alone, and now I am going to be kicking off another branch of the project.

Neurologist and author Anne Liptonhas been hugely supportive of me already in this endeavor, and she recently gave me the idea to host a weekly lit-chat on Twitter under the hashtag. This basically means that once per week, I will be on the hashtag ready to answer any questions or talk with anyone who wants to discuss the project and its subject. This is going to take place every Friday, starting this week on May 20th. Regular gatherings on the hashtag will mimic the “kickoff” Twitter party I hosted on May 6th. Share your thoughts and get your voice heard!

I would be more than happy to chat with anyone who has questions about this new aspect of the project. Tweet @oldpbfan21 or use #TheVoiceprintProject.

Thank you to all of you who have supported me already– and special thanks to Anne for all your ideas and advice! I’m very excited.

It’s official now! I am happy to say that The Voiceprint Project officially kicked off on Friday on Twitter, and now the initiative is in full swing. I’m super excited because I got some great support during the kickoff party, and the support has continued over the course of this weekend. To everybody who has helped in any way: thank you so much! None of this stuff would be possible without you guys to support me.

I want to take this opportunity to point out and clarify a few things for those who might have questions about the project. I’ve listed out my goals for the project here, and I also wrote about the general idea in the project’s introduction about a month ago.

The Twitter hashtag has been in use by me for a few weeks, and some others have begun to post on it. I want to make something clear: even though the official “kickoff party” on Twitter was this past Friday, anyone is welcome to post anything related to the project on the hashtag at any time.

I’m also excited to announce that I have a new aspect of the project in the works– picking a certain day of the week where a sort of “lit chat” will happen on the hashtag, open to anyone who wants to talk about the project or any of its main ideas. Think something kind of like what happens in the literary community on Twitter every Wednesday, #1linewed, where people share a single line from their manuscript in a Tweet. Stay tuned here on my blog for my announcement of what day I’ve chosen and when this will officially start!

Also in the works are interviews with young authors and writers as well as other members of the literary community. I’m working on so many things and I am so excited that this is all getting started. You’ll see me updating on my Twitter regularly, and blog posts will be more regular now too.

Thank you to everyone who has helped me get this started– I couldn’t do it without all of you!

Good morning, all! Today is the day– it’s the official launch of The Voiceprint Project. If you want to check it out, go to the Twitter hashtag, and feel free to send me a shout. It’ll go all day, and we’re going to be basically talking anything. I invite anyone who has advice, personal stories, quotes, or thoughts involving young writers to go ahead and join me! My Twitter is here.

I’d like to also point out that if for any reason you’re not able to participate or join in right away, that’s okay– because it’s not just today. This project is going to expand and get bigger as the time goes on. I’ll regularly post here about it and am always going to be looking for opportunities to spread the word. Given the growing amount of young people writing and breaking the ice in the publishing industry, this project will serve as a resource for people like myself who want to connect with other young writers.

I’ll be updating on my Twitter regularly all day. I hope you can join in!

Hello, wonderful people! As we are two weeks out from The Voiceprint Project officially kicking off on Twitter and otherwise, I wanted to share a few more details about my story as a young writer. This project will be an opportunity for people such as myself to share stories similar to the one I am about to tell. For those reading this who might be new to my blog, check out my original post about The Voiceprint Project here.

I want to talk about one of the central points of this project in relation to myself: how I realized, even at my age, that I want to be a writer.

When I was about six years old, I created a list of things that I wanted to be when I grew up– simultaneously, as in I wanted to do all of these jobs at the same time. I cannot recall exactly everything that was on that list, but I know that there were a lot of different things and many of them were very hard to accomplish or impossible. Among them were the following: an astronaut, a famous singer, a fashion designer, a dancer, a composer, and of course, as I was a six-year-old girl immersed in Disney movies and fairytales, a princess. What I know for sure is that a writer was never on that list, and didn’t even cross my mind as a possible path for my life until about a year and a half ago.

I’ve always been a writer, but I never formally classified myself as one until then. When I was about the age at which I comprised the list of jobs, I also wrote short stories. They still aren’t finished, because I would handwrite two pages and then get tired of it, but they were short stories nonetheless. The most prominent one that comes to mind was an attempted novel called Wish about the fearless Charlotte, her younger (and irresistibly adorable) brother Austin, and the adventure they went on when they discovered that there was a mermaid named Pearl living in the town pool. I never actually got to write about Pearl or anything they did with her… I got to the part where Austin bangs on Charlotte’s door one summer morning declaring that “we’re going to the pool” and she “had better get dressed”. I had big plans for Pearl and the siblings; they were going to go on a magical adventure through the sea, counter the evil mermaid Storm, and go on a quest to save Pearl’s life. It was, obviously, geared towards kids around the age I was when I got the idea for it, and maybe I’ll pick it up again one day. But even at that point in my youth, I didn’t realize that I wanted to be a writer.

Fast-forward about five years or so. I started writing other things, short stories about characters from movies, TV shows, and video games I enjoyed. I realized that I liked to write, that this was something I enjoyed spending my free time doing.

Then came the magic moment– in January of 2014, inspiration struck me in a way it had never before. We had made multitudes of paper cranes in my eighth-grade English class for a community project. They were everywhere– in the classrooms, in desks, in cubbies, on the floor. One day, I went to open my locker and one flew out, and from that little piece of origami came the inspiration for my first novel. That summer, I started writing to be heard; I started writing for others, not just for myself. And now I know that it’s what I want to do.

So now, to other young writers: I’d love to know your stories. Let’s spread our ideas and voices together. Give me a shout on Twitter or leave me a comment below.

“A voiceprint is a set of measurable characteristics of a human voice that uniquely identifies an individual.” (from WhatIs.com)

This past autumn, I went to my first writing conference. I had no idea what to expect. I’d never been to any formal, organized gathering of other writers before, and certainly hadn’t been exposed to real, live people in the publishing industry. It all seemed pretty scary to me, but I was determined to go, despite the fact that I knew I would likely be the only person there under the age of eighteen.

So on November 14th, I went into Boston and was dropped off at the hotel where it was being held. If you’ve been to a writing conference before, you probably know what I’m talking about when I say that I was both excited and terrified at the same time. Once the day began, however, it was not nearly as daunting as I expected it to be. I vigorously took notes (seriously– I wrote down almost everything from the talks, just so I would remember it) and practiced my pitch just about every free second I had. I had the privilege of pitching Jessica Sinsheimer of Sarah Jane Freymann Literary Agency while I was there– and side note– she’s a super nice person and you should definitely check her out online. She’s been involved in creating some really fantastic tools for writers in the publishing process, too– you have no idea how much time I’ve spent scrolling the #MSWL hashtag and how much it’s helped me throughout my querying process.

During the pitch session, Ms. Sinsheimer mentioned to me (after I told her that I’m fifteen) that she had been seeing a lot more younger writers like myself seeking publication. She went on to say that she thought it would be cool if there were a way to connect those young writers via social media. And I loved this idea, which leads me to why I’m making this post about it now. After leaving the conference, I did some brainstorming, and continued to do so for several months, which led to the development of the idea and the writing of this post.

Now there’s a name for it. I’m starting The Voiceprint Project. This is an initiative I’m taking to try and connect young writers online, encourage the spread of our ideas and stories of our experiences, and of course, talk about writing. The reason I’m calling it ‘voiceprint’ is because I believe that all writers of all types have a unique voice, their own groundbreaking ideas, and a story to tell, and no one should be left out from that even if they’re young like I am. We all ultimately have the same goal in the writing community– for our work to be read and to spread our message through writing. Yes, I’m only fifteen, but I was just as serious about being at that writing conference in November as any other person in the room, and I believe that the writing world is one of the few places where it doesn’t matter how old you are. The thing that really matters is that you have a story you want to tell.

I invite any young or student writers, both published and unpublished, to join me in a Twitter party on May 6th to kick off the project. We’ll meet new people, talk about our experiences, and share our thoughts on just about anything to do with writing and the publishing process. If you know a young writer, spread the word!

I’ll be updating on this site and on my Twitter (@oldpbfan21) about the project as it takes shape and May 6th comes closer.